Chapter XII: Act V: Scene I (2)

I, that even now lisp'd like an amorist,
Am turn'd into a snaphance[364] satirist.
O title, which my judgment doth adore!
But I, dull-sprited fat Boeotian[365] boor,
Do far off honour that censorian seat;
But if I could in milk-white robes entreat
Plebeians' favour, I would show to be
_Tribunus plebis_, 'gainst the villany
Of these same Proteans, whose hypocrisy
Doth still abuse our fond credulity. 10
But since myself am not immaculate,
But many spots my mind doth vitiate,
I'll leave the white robe and the biting rhymes
Unto our modern Satire's sharpest lines,
Whose hungry fangs snarl at some secret sin,
And in such pitchy clouds enwrappèd been
His Sphinxian riddles, that old OEdipus
Would be amazed, and take it in foul snuffs
That such Cymmerian darkness should involve
A quaint conceit that he could not resolve. 20
O darkness palpable! Egypt's black night!
My wit is stricken blind, hath lost his sight;
My shins are broke with groping for some sense,
To know to what his words have reference.
Certes, _sunt_ but _non videntur_ that I know;
Reach me some poets' index that will show.
_Imagines Deorum_, Book of Epithets,
_Natalis Comes_,[366] thou I know recites,
And makest anatomy of poesy;
Help me to unmask the satire's secrecy; 30
Delphic Apollo, aid me to unrip
These intricate deep oracles of wit--
These dark enigmas, and strange riddling sense,
Which pass my dullard brain's intelligence.
Fie on my senseless pate! Now I can show
Thou writest that which I nor thou dost know.
Who would imagine that such squint-eyed sight
Could strike the world's deformities so right?
But take heed, Pallas, lest thou aim awry;
Love nor yet Hate had e'er true-judging eye. 40
Who would once dream that that same elegy,
That fair-framed piece of sweetest poesy,
Which Muto put betwixt his mistress' paps
(When he, quick-witted, call'd her Cruel Chaps,
And told her there he might his dolors read
Which she, O she! upon his heart had spread),
Was penn'd by Roscio the tragedian?
Yet Muto, like a good Vulcanian--
An honest cuckold--calls the bastard, son,
And brags of that which others for him done. 50
Satire, thou liest, for that same elegy
Is Muto's own, his own dear poesy:
Why, 'tis his own, and dear, for he did pay
Ten crowns for it, as I heard Roscius say.--
Who would imagine yonder sober man,
That same devout meal-mouth'd precisian,
That cries "Good brother," "Kind sister," makes a duck
After the antique grace, can always pluck
A sacred book out of his civil hose,
And at th' op'ning and at our stomach's close, 60
Says with a turn'd-up eye a solemn grace
Of half an hour; then with silken face
Smiles on the holy crew, and then doth cry,
"O manners! O times of impurity!"
What that depaints[367] a church-reformed state,
The which the female tongues magnificate,
Because that Plato's odd opinion
Of all things common hath strong motion
In their weak minds;--who thinks that this good man
Is a vile, sober, damned politician? 70
Not I, till with his bait of purity
He bit me sore in deepest usury.
No Jew, no Turk, would use a Christian
So inhumanely as this Puritan.
Diomedes' jades were not so bestial
As this same seeming saint--vile cannibal!
Take heed, O world! take heed advisedly
Of these same damnèd anthropophagi.
I had rather be within a harpy's claws
Than trust myself in their devouring jaws, 80
Who all confusion to the world would bring
Under the form of their new discipline.
O I could say, Briareus' hundred hands
Were not so ready to bring Jove in bands,
As these to set endless contentious strife
Betwixt Jehovah and his sacred wife!
But see--who's yonder? True Humility,
The perfect image of fair Courtesy;
See, he doth deign to be in servitude
Where he hath no promotion's livelihood! 90
Mark, he doth courtesy, and salutes a block,
Will seem to wonder at a weathercock;
Trenchmore[368] with apes, play music to an owl,
Bless his sweet honour's running brasil[369] bowl;
Cries "Bravely broke!" when that his lordship miss'd,
And is of all the throngèd[370] scaffold hiss'd;
O is not this a courteous-minded man?
No fool, no; a damn'd Machiavelian;
Holds candle to the devil for a while,
That he the better may the world beguile, 100
That's fed with shows. He hopes, though some repine,
When sun is set the lesser stars will shine;
He is within a haughty malcontent,
Though he do use such humble blandishment.
But, bold-faced Satire, strain not over-high,
But laugh and chuck at meaner gullery.
In faith, yon is a well-faced gentleman;
See how he paceth like a Cyprian!
Fair amber tresses of the fairest hair
That ere were wavèd by our London air; 110
Rich lacèd suit, all spruce, all neat, in truth.
Ho, Lynceus! what's yonder brisk neat youth
'Bout whom yon troop of gallants flocken so,
And now together to Brown's Common go?
Thou know'st, I am sure; for thou canst cast thine eye
Through nine mud walls, or else old poets lie.
"'Tis loose-legg'd Lais, that same common drab
For whom good Tubrio took the mortal stab."[371]
Ha, ha! Nay, then, I'll never rail at those
That wear a codpis,[372] thereby to disclose 120
What sex they are, since strumpets breeches use,
And all men's eyes save Lynceus can abuse.
Nay, stead of shadow, lay the substance out,
Or else, fair Briscus, I shall stand in doubt
What sex thou art, since such hermaphrodites,
Such Protean shadows so delude our sights.
Look, look, with what a discontented grace
Bruto the traveller doth sadly[373] pace
'Long Westminster! O civil-seeming shade,
Mark his sad colours!--how demurely clad! 130
Staidness itself, and Nestor's gravity,
Are but the shade of his civility.
And now he sighs: "O thou corrupted age,
Which slight regard'st men of sound carriage!
Virtue, knowledge, fly to heaven again;
Deign not 'mong these ungrateful sots remain!
Well, some tongues I know, some countries I have seen,
And yet these oily snails respectless been
Of my good parts." O worthless puffy slave!
Didst thou to Venice go ought[374] else to have, 140
But buy a lute and use a courtesan,[375]
And there to live like a Cyllenian?[376]
And now from thence what hither dost thou bring,
But surphulings,[377] new paints, and poisoning,[378]
Aretine's[379] pictures, some strange luxury,
And new-found use of Venice venery?
What art thou but black clothes? Sad Bruto, say,
Art anything but only sad[380] array?
Which I am sure is all thou brought'st from France,
Save Naples pox and Frenchmen's dalliance; 150
From haughty Spain, what brought'st thou else beside
But lofty looks and their Lucifrian pride?
From Belgia, what but their deep bezeling,[381]
Their boot-carouse[382] and their beer-buttering?
Well, then, exclaim not on our age, good man,
But hence, polluted Neapolitan.
Now, Satire, cease to rub our gallèd skins,
And to unmask the world's detested sins;
Thou shalt as soon draw Nilus river dry
As cleanse the world from foul impiety. 160

[364] A spring-lock to a gun; hence applied to anything that goes
off sharply.

[365] Old ed. "Boetian."

[366] Old ed. "_Natales Comes_."--Noël Conti (1520-1580), a
native of Milan, better known under his Latinised name, Natalis
Comes, was the author of _Mythologiæ, sive explicationis
Fabularum, libri decem_, first printed at Venice in 1551, and
frequently reprinted. To some editions are appended _Deorum
Imagines_ ... _M. Antonii Tritonii Vtinensis_. Many old
treatises on mythology have the title _Imagines Deorum_.

[367] We had the word "depaint" in vol. i., p. 90. It is as old
as Chaucer.

[368] Dance trenchmore--a lively rustic dance.

[369] A sort of hard wood, used in dyeing to produce a red
colour.--It is a very old word and is still in use.

[370] Old ed. "thurnged."

[371] It has been suggested, without the slightest shadow of
foundation, that the allusion is to the death of Marlowe. Dr.
Nicholson (Grosart's _Marston_, p. xlvi.) says:--"If Tubrio
be Marlowe, then the hitherto unknown courtesan was the
hermaphroditic 'Moll Cutpurse'" At the earliest computation Moll
was born in 1584-5 (see Middleton, iv. 3); and Marlowe died in
1593.--(In old ed. the line runs:--"For from good Tubrio looke
the mortall stab." The correction is made in the author's list of
errata.)

[372] I have kept this spelling, as it was doubtless used
intentionally. Nashe, in his droll abuse of Barnabe Barnes,
writes:--"The first of them (which is Barnes) presently upon it,
because he would be noted, getting him a strange pair of
Babylonian breeches with a _codpisse_ as big as a Bolonian
sausage," &c. (_Works_, ed. Grosart, iii. 162).

[373] Cf. vol. i. p. 12, "Now as solemn as a traveller," and the
note on that passage.

[374] Old ed. "oft"--corrected in the author's list of errata.

[375] Old ed. "Currezan."

[376] Mercury was born on Cyllene, a mountain in Arcadia. Hence
Marston uses the term, Cyllenian for a person of mercurial
disposition.

[377] Cosmetics.

[378] Nashe in _The Unfortunate Traveller_ writes in a
similar strain:--"Italy, the paradise of the earth and the
epicure's heaven, how doth it form our young master?... From
thence he brings the art of atheism, the art of epicurising, the
art of whoring." Ascham and others make similar observations.

[379] Illustrations (after paintings of Giulio Romano) of the
positions in venery. Aretine wrote verses to accompany the
designs.

[380] Old ed. "say"--corrected in the author's list of errata.

[381] Tippling.

[382] Dr. Grosart quotes from Hall's Satires, vi. i. 81-2:--
"When erst our dry-soul'd sires so lavish were
To charge whole _bootsful_ to their friends' welfare."

SATIRE III.

_Quædam et sunt, et videntur._

Now, grim Reproof, swell in my rough-hued rhyme,
That thou mayst vex the guilty of our time.
Yon is a youth whom how can I o'er-slip,
Since he so jump doth in my meshes hit?
He hath been longer in preparing him
Than Terence wench; and now behold he's seen.
Now, after two years' fast and earnest prayer
The fashion change not (lest he should despair
Of ever hoarding up more fair gay clothes),
Behold at length in London street he shows. 10
His ruff did eat more time in neatest setting
Than Woodstock's[383] work in painful perfecting;
It hath more doubles far than Ajax' shield
When he 'gainst Troy did furious battle wield.
Nay, he doth wear an emblem 'bout his neck;
For under that fair ruff so sprucely set,
Appears a fall, a falling-band forsooth.
O dapper, rare, complete, sweet nitty[384] youth!
Jesu Maria! How his clothes appear
Cross'd and recross'd with lace, sure for some fear 20
Lest that some spirit with a tippet mace[385]
Should with a ghastly show affright his face.
His hat, himself, small crown and huge great brim,
Fair outward show, and little wit within.
And all the band with feathers he doth fill,
Which is a sign of a fantastic still.
Why, so[386] he is, his clothes do sympathise
And with his inward spirit humorise,
As sure as (some do tell me) evermore
A goat doth stand before a brothel door. 30
His clothes perfumed, his fusty mouth is aired,
His chin new swept, his very cheeks are glaired.[387]
But ho! what Ganymede is that doth grace
The gallant's heels? One who for two days' space
Is closely hired. Now who dares not call
This Æsop's crow--fond, mad, fantastical?
An open ass, that is not yet so wise
As his derided fondness to disguise.
Why, thou art Bedlam mad, stark lunatic,
And glori'st to be counted a fantastic; 40
Thou neither art, nor yet will seem to be,
Heir to some virtuous praisèd quality.
O frantic man! that thinks all villany
The complete honours of nobility!
When some damn'd vice, some strange misshapen suit,
Make youths esteem themselves in high repute.
O age! in which our gallants boast to be
Slaves unto riot and rude luxury!
Nay, when they blush, and think an honest act
Doth their supposèd virtues maculate! 50
Bedlam, Frenzy, Madness, Lunacy,
I challenge all your moody empery
Once to produce a more distracted man
Than is inamorato Lucian.
For when my ears received a fearful sound
That he was sick, I went, and there I found
Him laid of love, and newly brought to bed
Of monstrous folly and a frantic head.
His chamber hang'd about with elegies,
With sad complaints of his love's miseries; 60
His windows strew'd with sonnets, and the glass
Drawn full of love-knots. I approach'd the ass,
And straight he weeps, and sighs some sonnet out
To his fair love! And then he goes about
For to perfume her rare perfection
With some sweet-smelling pink epitheton;
Then with a melting look he writhes his head,
And straight in passion riseth in his bed;
And having kiss'd his hand, stroke up his hair,
Made a French conge, cries, "O cruel fear!" 70
To the antic bedpost. I laugh'd amain,
That down my cheeks the mirthful drops did rain.
Well, he's no Janus, but substantial,
In show and essence a good natural;
When as thou hear'st me ask spruce Duceus
From whence he comes; and he straight answers us,
From Lady Lilla; and is going straight
To the Countess of (----), for she doth wait
His coming, and will surely send her coach,
Unless he make the speedier approach: 80
Art not thou ready for to break thy spleen
At laughing at the fondness thou hast seen
In this vain-glorious fool, when thou dost know
He never durst unto these ladies show
His pippin face? Well, he's no accident,
But real, real, shameless, impudent;
And yet he boasts, and wonders that each man
Can call him by his name, sweet Ducean;
And is right proud that thus his name is known.
Ay, Duceus, ay, thy name is too far blown: 90
The world too much, thyself too little know'st,
Thy private self. Why, then, should Duceus boast?
But, humble Satire, wilt thou deign display
These open nags, which purblind eyes bewray?
Come, come, and snarl more dark at secret sin,
Which in such labyrinths enwrappèd bin,
That, Ariadne, I must crave thy aid
To help me find where this foul monster's laid;
Then will I drive the Minotaur from us,
And seem to be a second Theseus. 100

[383] The maze at Woodstock.

[384] I suppose that "nitty" = _spruce_ (_Lat._
nitidus). The usual meaning of "nitty" is--_lousy_.

[385] Carried by the sheriff's officer when he arrested a man for
debt.

[386] In the original, the couplet "Why, so ... humorise,"
follows l. 36. Mr. Gosse pointed out this error (Grosart's
_Marston_, p. li.); he proposes to put the couplet about the
goat lower down.

[387] Anointed with the white of an egg.--Old eds. "glazed."

SATIRE IV.

_Reactio._

Now doth Rhamnusia Adrastian,
Daughter of Night, and of the Ocean,
Provoke my pen. What cold Saturnian
Can hold, and hear such vile detraction?
Ye pines of Ida, shake your fair-grown height,
For Jove at first dash will with thunder fight;
Ye cedars, bend, 'fore lightning you dismay;
Ye lions tremble, for an ass doth bray.
Who cannot rail?--what dog but dare to bark
'Gainst Phoebe's brightness in the silent dark? 10
What stinking scavenger (if so he will,
Though streets be fair) but may right easily fill
His dungy tumbrel? Sweep, pare, wash, make clean,
Yet from your fairness he some dirt can glean.
The windy-colic striv'd to have some vent,
And now 'tis flown, and now his rage is spent.
So have I seen the fuming waves to fret,
And in the end naught but white foam beget;
So have I seen the sullen clouds to cry,
And weep for anger that the earth was dry, 20
After their spite that all the hail-shot drops
Could never pierce the crystal water tops,
And never yet could work her more disgrace
But only bubble quiet Thetis' face
Vain envious detractor from the good,
What cynic spirit rageth in thy blood?
Cannot a poor mistaken title 'scape,
But thou must that into thy tumbrel scrape?
Cannot some lewd immodest beastliness
Lurk and lie hid in just forgetfulness, 30
But Grillus'[388] subtile-smelling swinish snout
Must scent and grunt, and needs will find it out?
Come, dance, ye stumbling satyrs by his side,
If he list once the Sion Muse deride;
Ye Granta's white nymphs, come, and with you bring
Some sillabub, whilst he doth sweetly sing
'Gainst Peter's tears[389] and Mary's moving moan,
And like a fierce enragèd boar doth foam
At sacred sonnets. O daring hardiment!
At Bartas' sweet _Semains_[390] rail impudent; 40
At Hopkins, Sternhold, and the Scottish King,[391]
At all translators that do strive to bring
That stranger language to our vulgar tongue,
Spit in thy poison their fair acts among;
Ding[392] them all down from fair Jerusalem,
And mew them up in thy deserved Bedlam.
Shall Paynims honour their vile falsèd gods
With sprightly wits, and shall not we by odds
Far, far more strive with wit's best quintessence
To adore the sacred ever-living essence? 50
Hath not strong reason moved the legists' mind,
To say the fairest of all nature's kind
The prince by his prerogative may claim?
Why may not then our souls, without thy blame
(Which is the best thing that our God did frame),
Devote the best part to his sacred name,
And with due reverence and devotion,
Honour his name with our invention?
No, poesy not fit for such an action,
It is defiled with superstition: 60
It honoured Baal, therefore pollute, pollute--
Unfit for such a sacred institute.
So have I heard a heretic maintain
The church unholy, where Jehovah's name
Is now adored, because he surely knows
Sometimes[393] it was defiled with Popish shows;
The bells profane, and not to be endured,
Because to Popish rites they were inured.
Pure madness! Peace, cease to be insolent,
And be not outward sober, inly impudent. 70
Fie, inconsiderate! it grieveth me
An academic should so senseless be.
Fond censurer! why should those mirrors seem
So vile to thee, which better judgments deem
Exquisite then, and in our polish'd times
May run for senseful tolerable lines?
What, not _mediocria firma_ from thy spite?
But must thy envious hungry fangs needs light
On _Magistrates' Mirror_?[394] Must thou needs detract
And strive to work his ancient honour's wrack? 80
What, shall not Rosamond[395] or Gaveston
Ope their sweet lips without detraction?
But must our modern critic's envious eye
Seem thus to quote some gross deformity,
Where art, not error, shineth in their style,
But error, and no art, doth thee beguile?
For tell me, critic, is not fiction
The soul of poesy's invention?
Is't not the form, the spirit, and the essence,
The life, and the essential difference, 90
Which _omni_, _semper_, _soli_, doth agree
To heavenly descended poesy?
Thy wit God comfort, mad chirurgion.
What, make so dangerous an incision?--
At first dash whip away the instrument
Of poet's procreation! Fie, ignorant!
When as the soul and vital blood doth rest,
And hath in fiction only interest,
What, Satire, suck the soul from poesy,
And leave him spriteless! O impiety! 100
Would ever any erudite pedant[396]
Seem in his artless lines so insolent?
But thus it is when petty Priscians
Will needs step up to be censorians.
When once they can in true scann'd verses frame
A brave encomium of good Virtue's name;
Why, thus it is, when mimic apes will strive
With iron wedge the trunks of oaks to rive.
But see, his spirit of detraction
Must nibble at a glorious action. 110
_Euge!_ some gallant spirit, some resolvèd blood,
Will hazard all to work his country's good,
And to enrich his soul and raise his name,
Will boldly sail unto the rich Guiane:
What then? Must straight some shameless satirist,[397]
With odious and opprobrious terms insist
To blast so high resolv'd intention
With a malignant vile detraction?
So have I seen a cur dog in the street
Piss 'gainst the fairest posts he still could meet; 120
So have I seen the March wind strive to fade
The fairest hue that art or nature made:
So envy still doth bark at clearest shine,
And strives to stain heroic acts divine.
Well, I have cast thy water, and I see
Th' art fall'n to wit's extremest poverty,
Sure in consumption of the spritely part.
Go, use some cordial for to cheer thy heart,
Or else I fear that I one day shall see
Thee fall into some dangerous lethargy. 130
But come, fond braggart, crown thy brows with bay,
Intrance thyself in thy sweet ecstasy;
Come, manumit thy plumy pinion,
And scour the sword of elvish champion;
Or else vouchsafe to breathe in wax-bound quill,
And deign our longing ears with music fill;
Or let us see thee some such stanzas frame,
That thou mayst raise thy vile inglorious name.
Summon the Nymphs and Dryades to bring
Some rare invention, whilst thou dost sing 140
So sweet that thou mayst shoulder from above
The eagle from the stairs of friendly Jove,[398]
And lead sad Pluto captive with thy song,
Gracing thyself, that art obscured so long.
Come, somewhat say (but hang me when 'tis done)
Worthy of brass and hoary marble stone;
Speak, ye attentive swains, that heard him never,
Will not his pastorals[399] endure for ever?
Speak, ye that never heard him ought but rail,
Do not his poems bear a glorious sail? 150
Hath not he strongly justled from above
The eagle from the stairs of friendly Jove?
May be, may be; tut! 'tis his modesty;
He could, if that he would: nay, would, if could, I see.
Who cannot rail, and with a blasting breath
Scorch even the whitest lilies of the earth?
Who cannot stumble in a stuttering style,
And shallow heads with seeming shades beguile?
Cease, cease, at length to be malevolent
To fairest blooms of virtues eminent; 160
Strive not to soil the freshest hues on earth
With thy malicious and upbraiding breath.
Envy, let pines of Ida rest alone,
For they will grow spite of thy thunder-stone;
Strive not to nibble in their swelling grain
With toothless gums of thy detracting brain;
Eat not thy dam, but laugh and sport with me
At strangers' follies with a merry glee.
Let's not malign our kin. Then, satirist,
I do salute thee with an open fist.[400] 170

[388] The allusion in the following lines is to Hall's Satires,
i. 8. See _Introduction_, vol. i.--Grillus was one of
Ulysses' companions who were turned into swine. When the others
rejoiced at resuming their human shape, Grillus preferred to
remain a swine.

[389] An allusion to Southwell's poems _Saint Peter's
Complaint_ and _The Virgin Mary to Christ on the Cross_.

[390] The allusion is to Sylvester's once famous translations of
Du Bartas.

[391] James in his _Poetical Exercises_ (1591) published a
translation of Du Bartas' poem _The Furies_; but there seems
also to be a reference to the metrical translation of the psalms
(first published in 1631), on which James was known to be
engaged.

[392] Dash.

[393] Often used for _sometime_.

[394] In Hall's Satires, i. 5, the _Mirror of Magistrates_ is
ridiculed.

[395] The allusion is to Daniel's _Complaint of Rosamond_, 1592,
and to Michael Drayton's _Complaint of Gaveston_, 1593. I cannot
discover any abuse of Daniel or Drayton in Hall's Satires. I have
elsewhere suggested (Marlowe, iii. 243) that Marston is here
glancing at Sir John Davies' forty-fifth epigram, in which a
conceit from Daniel's _Rosamond_ is ridiculed.

[396] A sneer at Hall, who left Cambridge (soon to return),
before completing his course, to take temporary work as a
schoolmaster, as he relates in _Some Specialities of the Life of
Joseph Hall, Bishop of Norwich_ (Works, ed. Wynter, 1. xxiv).

[397] The satirist is Hall, who wrote in the third satire of Book
iv. of _Virgidem_:-- "Ventrous Fortunio his farm hath sold And
gads to _Guiane_ land to fish for gold."

[398] Marston is ridiculing Hall's _Defiance to Envy_, prefixed
to _Virgidem_.:--
"Or would we loose her plumy pinion,
Manacled long with bonds of modest fear,
Soon might she have those kestrels proud outgone
Whose flighty wings are dew'd with weeter [_sic_] air;
And hopen now to _shoulder from above
The eagle from the stairs of friendly Jove_.

"Or list she rather in late triumph rear
Eternal trophies to some conqueror
Whose dead deserts slept in his sepulchre,
And never saw nor life nor light before,
To lead sad Pluto captive with my song
To grace the triumphs he obscured so long, &c."

[399] It is not improbable that Hall published an early volume of
pastorals which is now unknown. See Corser's _Collectanea_, vii.
134. In _Virgidem_. vi. 1. ll. 175-184 ("Shall the controller of
proud Nemesis, &c."), Hall replies to Marston's raillery.

[400] Edward Guilpin in his sixth Satire (_Skialetheia_, 1598,
sig. E. V.) alludes to Marston's _Reactio_:--
"The double-volum'd satire praised is
And liked of divers for his rods in piss,
Yet other some who would her credit crack,
Have clapp'd Reactio's action on her back."

The expression "rods in piss" is used in reference to Sat. i. l.
44. of the _Scourge of Villainy_. "Double-volum'd satire" seems
to refer to Hall's two collections of Satires; but the passage is
obscure.

SATIRE V.

_Parva magna, magna nulla._

Ambitious Gorgons, wide-mouth'd Lamians,[401]
Shape-changing Proteans, damn'd Briarians,
Is Minos dead, is Rhadamanth asleep,
That ye thus dare unto Jove's palace creep?
What, hath Rhamnusia spent her knotted whip,
That ye dare strive on Hebe's cup to sip?
Yet know Apollo's quiver is not spent,
But can abate your daring hardiment.
Python is slain, yet his accursèd race
Dare look divine Astrea in the face; 10
Chaos return, and with confusion
Involve the world with strange disunion;
For Pluto sits in that adorèd chair
Which doth belong unto Minerva's heir.
O hecatombe! O catastrophe![402]
From Midas' pomp to Irus' beggary!
Prometheus, who celestial fire
Did steal from heaven, therewith to inspire
Our earthly bodies with a senseful mind,
Whereby we might the depth of nature find, 20
Is ding'd[403] to hell, and vulture eats his heart,
Which did such deep philosophy impart
To mortal men; when thieving Mercury,
That even in his new-born infancy
Stole fair Apollo's quiver and Jove's mace,
And would have filch'd the lightning from his place,
But that he fear'd he should have burnt his wing
And sing'd his downy feathers' new-come spring;
He that in ghastly shade of night doth lead
Our souls unto the empire of the dead; 30
When he that better doth deserve a rope
Is a fair planet in our horoscope,
And now hath Caduceus in his hand,
Of life and death that hath the sole command.
Thus petty thefts are paid and soundly whipt,
But greater crimes are slightly overslipt;
Nay, he's a god that can do villany
With a good grace and glib facility.
The harmless hunter, with a ventrous eye,
When unawares he did Diana spy 40
Nak'd in the fountain, he became straightway
Unto his greedy hounds a wishèd prey,
His own delights taking away his breath,
And all ungrateful forced his fatal death
(And ever since hounds eat their masters clean,
For so Diana curst them in the stream).
When strong-back'd Hercules, in one poor night,
With great, great ease, and wond[e]rous delight,
In strength of lust and Venus' surquedry,
Robb'd fifty wenches of virginity-- 50
Far more than lusty Laurence[404]--yet, poor soul,
He with Actæon drinks of Nemis'[405] bowl:
When Hercules' lewd act is registered,
And for his fruitful labour deified,
And had a place in heaven him assigned,
When he the world unto the world resigned.
Thus little scapes are deeply punishèd,
But mighty villains are for gods adored.
Jove brought his sister to a nuptial bed,
And hath an Hebe and a Ganymede, 60
A Leda, and a thousand more beside
His chaste Alcmena and his sister-bride,
Who 'fore his face was odiously defil'd,
And by Ixion grossly got with child:
This thunderer, that right vertuously
Thrust forth his father from his empery,
Is now the great monarcho of the earth,
Whose awful nod, whose all-commanding breath,
Shakes Europe's ground-work; and his title makes[406]
As dread a noise as when a cannon shakes 70
The subtile air. Thus hell-bred villany
Is still rewarded with high dignity,
When Sisyphus, that did but once reveal
That this incestuous villain had to deal
In isle Phliunte with Ægina fair,[407]
Is damn'd to hell, in endless black despair
Ever to rear his tumbling stone upright
Upon the steepy mountain's lofty height;
His stone will never now get greenish moss,
Since he hath thus incurred so great a loss 80
As Jove's high favour. But it needs must be
Whilst Jove doth rule and sway the empery.
And poor Astrea's fled into an isle,
And lives a poor and banishèd exile,
And there penn'd up, sighs in her sad lament,
Wearing away in pining languishment.
If that Silenus' ass do chance to bray,
And so the satyrs' lewdness doth bewray,
Let him for ever be a sacrifice;
Prick, spur, beat, load, for ever tyrannise 90
Over the fool. But let some Cerberus
Keep back the wife of sweet-tongued Orpheus,
Gnato[408] applauds the hound. Let that same child
Of night and sleep (which hath the world defiled
With odious railing) bark 'gainst all the work
Of all the gods, and find some error lurk
In all the graces; let his laver[409] lip
Speak in reproach of Nature's workmanship;
Let him upbraid fair Venus, if he list,
For her short heel; let him with rage insist 100
To snarl at Vulcan's man, because he was
Not made with windows of transparent glass,
That all might see the passions of his mind;
Let his all-blasting tongue great errors find
In Pallas' house, because if next should burn,
It could not from the sudden peril turn;
Let him upbraid great Jove with luxury,
Condemn the heaven's queen of jealousy:
Yet this same Stygian Momus must be praised,
And to some godhead at the least be raised. 110
But if poor Orpheus sing melodiously,
And strive with music's sweetest symphony
To praise the gods, and unadvisedly
Do but o'er-slip one drunken deity,
Forthwith the bouzing Bacchus out doth send
His furious Bacchides, to be revenged;
And straight they tear the sweet musician,
And leave him to the dogs' division.
Hebrus, bear witness of their cruelty,
For thou didst view poor Orpheus' tragedy. 120
Thus slight neglects are deepest villany,
But blasting mouths deserve a deity.
Since Gallus slept, when he was set to watch
Lest Sol or Vulcan should Mavortius catch
In using Venus; since the boy did nap,
Whereby bright Phoebus did great Mars intrap,
Poor Gallus now (whilom to Mars so dear)
Is turnèd to a crowing chaunticlere;
And ever since, 'fore that the sun doth shine
(Lest Phoebus should with his all-piercing eyne 130
Descry some Vulcan), he doth crow full shrill,
That all the air with echoes he doth fill;
Whilst Mars, though all the gods do see his sin,
And know in what lewd vice he liveth in,
Yet is adored still, and magnified,
And with all honours duly worshipped.
_Euge!_ Small faults to mountains straight are raised;
Slight scapes are whipt, but damnèd deeds are praised.
Fie, fie! I am deceived all this while,
A mist of errors doth my sense beguile; 140
I have been long of all my wits bereaven;
Heaven for hell taking, taking hell for heaven;
Virtue for vice, and vice for virtue still;
Sour for sweet, and good for passing ill.
If not, would vice and odious villany
Be still rewarded with high dignity?
Would damned Jovians be of all men praised,
And with high honours unto heaven raised?
'Tis so, 'tis so; riot and luxury
Are virtuous, meritorious chastity: 150
That which I thought to be damn'd hell-born pride,
Is humble modesty, and nought beside;
That which I deemèd Bacchus' surquedry,
Is grave and staid, civil sobriety.
O then, thrice holy age, thrice sacred men,
'Mong whom no vice a satire can discern,
Since lust is turnèd into chastity,
And riot unto sad sobriety,
Nothing but goodness reigneth in our age,
And virtues all are join'd in marriage! 160
Here is no dwelling for impiety,
No habitation for base villany;
Here are no subject for reproof's sharp vein;
Then hence, rude satire, make away amain,
And seek a seat where more impurity
Doth lie and lurk in still security!
Now doth my satire stagger in a doubt,
Whether to cease or else to write it out.
The subject is too sharp for my dull quill;
Some son of Maia, show thy riper skill; 170
For I'll go turn my tub against the sun,
And wistly mark how higher planets run,
Contemplating their hidden motion.
Then on some Latmos with Endymion,
I'll slumber out my time in discontent,
And never wake to be malevolent,
A beadle to the world's impurity.
But ever sleep in still security.
If this displease the world's wrong-judging sight,
It glads my soul, and in some better sprite 180
I'll write again. But if that this do please,
Hence, hence, satiric Muse, take endless ease,
Hush now, ye band-dogs, bark no more at me,
But let me slide away in secrecy.

EPICTETUS.[410]

[401] In Topsel's _Hist. of Four-footed Beasts_ (ed. 1658, pp.
352-5) there is an interesting chapter "of the Lamia."

[402] "_Huc usque Xylinum._"--Marginal note in old ed. The
meaning is "Bombast--balderdash--up to this point." Marston lets
the reader know that the high-sounding lines at the beginning of
this satire are to be taken in jest. See more on p. 342. (_Lat._
xylinum, Gr. xulinon = cotton, bombast.)

[403] Dashed.

[404] Dyce, in a note on a passage of _The Captain_, iv. 3
(_Beaumont and Fletcher_, iii. 295), quotes from _A Brown Dozen
of Drunkards_, 1648, sig. C:--"This late Lusty Lawrence, that
Lancashire Lad, who had seventeen bastards in one year, if we
believe his Ballad," &c.

[405] Seemingly a contraction (_metri causa_) of "Nemesis."

[406] "_Rex hominumque deorumque._"--Marginal note in old ed.

[407] One legend makes Asopus, father of Aegina, to have been the
river that watered the Phliasian territory in Argolis. See
Heyne's note on Apollodorus' _Bibl._, iii. 12. 5.

[408] Gnatho,--used by Plautus and Terence as a proper name for a
parasite (Gr. gnathon).

[409] "Laver lip" = hanging lip. Cf. Hall's Satires, ii. 2:--"A
_lave-ear'd_ ass with gold may trappèd be;" and again in iv.
1--"His ears hang _laving_ like a new-lugg'd swine."

[410] I fail to understand why Epictetus' name should stand here.
The conclusion of this satire is more in 'Ercles' vein than in
Epictetus'.--At the end of old ed. is a list of "Faults escaped."

THE SCOURGE OF VILLAINY.

_The Scovrge of Villanie. Three bookes of Satyres._
_Persevs._
_v v v Nec scompros_ [_sic_] _metuentia carmina nec thus._

_At London, Printed by I. R. and are to be sold by Iohn Buzbie, in
Paules Church-yard, at the signe of the Crane, 1598._ 8vo.

_The Scovrge of Villanie. Corrected, with the addition of newe
Satyres. Three Bookes of Satyres._

_Persivs._
_v v v Nec scombros metuentia carmina nec thus._

_At London, Printed by I. R. Anno Dom. 1599._ 8vo.

The letters "_v v v_" indicate that the dactyl at the beginning of
the line has been dropped.

_To_[411] _his most esteemed and best beloved Self
dat dedicatque._

[411] This dedication is not found in ed. 1598.

_To_ Detraction _I present my_ Poesy.

Foul canker of fair virtuous action,
Vile blaster of the freshest blooms on earth,
Envy's abhorrèd child, Detraction,
I here expose, to thy all-tainting breath,
The issue of my brain: snarl, rail, bark, bite,
Know that my spirit scorns Detraction's spite.

Know that the Genius, which attendeth on
And guides my powers intellectual,
Holds in all vile repute Detraction;
My soul an essence metaphysical, 10
That in the basest sort scorns critics' rage
Because he knows his sacred parentage.

My spirit is not puft[412] up with fat fume
Of slimy ale, nor Bacchus' heating grape.
My mind disdains the dungy muddy scum
Of abject thoughts and Envy's raging hate.
True judgment slight regards Opinion,
A spritely wit disdains Detraction.

A partial praise shall never elevate
My settled censure of my own esteem; 20
A canker'd verdict of malignant hate
Shall ne'er provoke me worse myself to deem.
Spite of despite and rancour's villainy,
I am myself, so is my poesy.

[412] Ed. 1598 "huft."

_In Lectores prorsus indignos._

Fie, Satire, fie! shall each mechanic slave,
Each dunghill peasant, free perusal have
Of thy well-labour'd lines?--each[413] satin suit,
Each quaint fashion-monger, whose sole repute
Rests in his trim gay clothes, lie slavering,
Tainting thy lines with his lewd censuring?
Shall each odd puisne[414] of the lawyer's inn,
Each barmy-froth, that last day did begin
To read his little, or his ne'er a whit,
Or shall some greater ancient, of less wit 10
(That never turn'd but brown tobacco leaves,
Whose senses some damn'd occupant[415] bereaves),
Lie gnawing on thy vacant time's expense,
Tearing thy rhymes, quite altering the sense?
Or shall perfum'd Castilio censure thee,
Shall he o'erview thy sharp-fang'd poesy
(Who ne'er read further than his mistress' lips),
Ne'er practised ought but some spruce cap'ring skips,
Ne'er in his life did other language use,
But "Sweet lady, fair mistress, kind heart, dear cuz"--
Shall this phantasma, this Coloss peruse, 21
And blast, with stinking breath, my budding muse?
Fie! wilt thou make thy wit a courtezan
For every broken handcraft's artisan?
Shall brainless cittern-heads,[416] each jobbernoul,[417]
Pocket the very genius of thy soul?
Ay, Phylo, ay, I'll keep an open hall,
A common and a sumptuous festival;
Welcome all eyes, all ears, all tongues to me,
Gnaw peasants on my scraps of poesy; 30
Castilios, Cyprians, court-boys, Spanish blocks,[418]
Ribanded[419] ears, Granado netherstocks,[420]
Fiddlers, scriveners, pedlars, tinkering knaves,
Base blue-coats,[421] tapsters, broad-cloth-minded slaves--
Welcome, i'faith; but may you ne'er depart
Till I have made your gallèd hides to smart.
Your gallèd hides? avaunt, base muddy scum,
Think you a satire's dreadful sounding drum
Will brace itself, and deign to terrify
Such abject peasants' basest roguery? 40
No, no, pass on, ye vain fantastic troop
Of puffy youths; know I do scorn to stoop
To rip your lives. Then hence, lewd nags, away,
Go read each post,[422] view what is play'd to-day,
Then to Priapus' gardens.[423] You, Castilio,
I pray thee let my lines in freedom go,
Let me alone, the madams call for thee,
Longing to laugh at thy wit's poverty.
Sirra livery cloak, you lazy slipper-slave,
Thou fawning drudge, what, wouldst thou satires have? 50
Base mind, away, thy master calls, be gone.
Sweet Gnato, let my poesy alone:
Go buy some ballad of the Fairy King,
And of the beggar wench[424] some roguy thing,
Which thou mayst chant unto the chamber-maid
To some vile tune, when that thy master's laid.
But will you needs stay? am I forced to bear
The blasting breath of each lewd censurer?
Must naught but clothes, and images of men,
But spriteless trunks, be judges of thy pen? 60
Nay then, come all; I prostitute my muse,
For all the swarms of idiots to abuse.
Read all, view all; even with my full consent,
So you will know that which I never meant;
So you will ne'er conceive, and yet dispraise
That which you ne'er conceived, and laughter raise
Where I but strive in honest seriousness
To scourge some soul-polluting beastliness.
So you will rail, and find huge errors lurk
In every corner of my cynic work. 70
Proface,[425] read on, for your extrem'st dislikes
Will add a pinion to my praise's flights.
O how I bristle up my plumes of pride,
O how I think my satire's dignifi'd,
When I once hear some quaint Castilio,
Some supple-mouth'd slave, some lewd Tubrio,
Some spruce pedant, or some span-new-come fry
Of inns-o'-court, striving to vilify
My dark reproofs! Then do but rail at me,
No greater honour craves my poesy. 80

1. But, ye diviner wits, celestial souls,
Whose free-born minds no kennel-thought controlls,
Ye sacred spirits, Maia's eldest sons--

2. Ye substance of the shadows of our age,
In whom all graces link in marriage,
To you how cheerfully my poem runs!

3. True-judging eyes, quick-sighted censurers,
Heaven's best beauties, wisdom's treasurers,
O how my love embraceth your great worth!

4. Ye idols of my soul, ye blessed spirits, 90
How shall I give true honour to your merits,
Which I can better think than here paint forth!

You sacred spirits, Maia's eldest sons,
To you how cheerfully my poem runs!
O how my love embraceth your great worth,
Which I can better think than here paint forth!
O rare!

[413] Ed. 1598 "shal each."

[414] A newly-entered student at the inns-of-court. Cf.
Middleton, iv. 37:--"Now I, not intending to understand her, but
like a puny at the inns of Venery, &c."

[415] See Dyce's _Shakesp. Gloss._, _s._ OCCUPY.

[416] In allusion to the grotesque figures carved on the tops of
citterns. See Nares' _Glossary_.

[417] "A jobbernoll. Teste de boeuf, michon, grosse
teste."--_Cotgrave._

[418] Spanish hats, fashionable at this time. "From Spain what
bringeth our traveller? A skull-crown'd hat of the fashion of an
old deep porrenger," &c.--Nashe's _Unfortunate Traveller_.

[419] See note, vol. ii. p. 391.

[420] So in the _Debate between Pride and Lowliness_:--"The
nether-stocks of pure Granada silk." See Fairholt's _History of
Costume_, 1860, p. 211.

[421] Serving-men.

[422] It was the custom to paste on a pillar near the theatre the
title of the play that was to be acted.

[423] In the suburbs--particularly near the Curtain Theatre--were
many gardens, "either paled or walled round very high, with their
arbours and bowers" (Stubbes), to which libertines resorted. See
Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps' chapter on "The Theatre and Curtain" in
_Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare_.

[424] An allusion to a jest (common in the fugitive poetry of the
time) about a beggar-wench, with a child at her back, who refused
the advances of a knight (on the ground that the child would be
injured in the amorous encounter), unless he would allow the
child to be strapped to his own back.

[425] "Proface"--an exclamation of welcome from the host to his
guests at a feast. See Nares' _Glossary_.

_To those that seem judicial Perusers._

Know, I hate to affect too much obscurity and harshness, because they profit no sense. To note vices, so that no man can understand them, is as fond as the French execution in picture. Yet there are some (too many) that think nothing good that is so courteous as to come within their reach. Terming all satires bastard which are not palpable dark, and so rough writ that the hearing of them read would set a man's teeth on edge; for whose unseasoned palate I wrote the first Satire, in some places too obscure, in all places misliking me. Yet when by some scurvy chance it shall come into the late perfumed fist of judicial Torquatus[426] (that, like some rotten stick in a troubled water, hath got a great deal of barmy[427] froth to stick to his sides), I know he will vouchsafe it some of his new-minted epithets (as _real_, _intrinsicate_, _Delphic_), when in my conscience he understands not the least part of it. But from thence proceeds his judgment. Persius is crabby, because ancient, and his jerks (being particularly given to private customs of his time) dusky. Juvenal (upon the like occasion) seems to our judgment gloomy. Yet both of them go a good seemly pace, not stumbling, shuffling. Chaucer is hard even to our understandings: who knows not the reason? how much more those old satires which express themselves in terms that breathed not long even in their days. But had we then lived, the understanding of them had been nothing hard. I will not deny there is a seemly decorum to be observed, and a peculiar kind of speech for a satire's lips, which I can willinglier conceive than dare to prescribe; yet let me have the substance rough, not the shadow. I cannot, nay, I will not delude your sight with mists; yet I dare defend my plainness against the verjuice-face of the crabbed'st satirist that ever stuttered. He that thinks worse of my rhymes than myself, I scorn him, for he cannot: he that thinks better, is a fool. So favour me, Good Opinion, as I am far from being a Suffenus.[428] If thou perusest me with an unpartial eye, read on: if otherwise, know I neither value thee nor thy censure.

W. KINSAYDER.

[426] A hit at Ben Jonson.--See Introduction to vol. i.

[427] Ridiculed by Ben Jonson in the _Poetaster_.

[428] The poet ridiculed by Catullus.

THE

SCOURGE OF VILLAINY.

PROEMIUM IN LIBRUM PRIMUM.

I bear the scourge of just Rhamnusia,
Lashing the lewdness of Britannia.
Let others sing as their good genius moves,
Of deep designs, or else of clipping loves:
Fair fall them all, that with wit's industry
Do clothe good subjects in true poesy;
But as for me, my vexèd thoughtful soul
Takes pleasure in displeasing sharp control.
Thou nursing mother of fair Wisdom's lore,
Ingenuous Melancholy, I implore 10
Thy grave assistance: take thy gloomy seat,
Enthrone thee in my blood; let me entreat,
Stay his quick jocund skips, and force him run
A sad-paced course, until my whips be done.
Daphne, unclip thine arms from my sad brow;
Black cypress crown me, whilst I up do plow
The hidden entrails of rank villainy,
Tearing the veil from damn'd impiety.
Quake, guzzel dogs,[429] that live on putrid slime,
Skud from the lashes of my yerking rhyme. 20

[429] "In other words, dogs of the gutter or drain. A small
gutter is still called a guzzle in some of the
provinces."--_Halliwell._

SATIRE I.

_Fronti nulla fides._

Marry, God forefend! Martius swears he'll stab:
Phrygio, fear not, thou art no lying drab.
What though dagger-hack'd mouths of his blade swears
It slew as many as figures of years
Aquafortis eat in't, or as many more
As methodist[430] Musus kill'd with hellebore
In autumn[431] last; yet he bears that male lie[432]
With as smooth calm as Mecho rivalry.
How ill his shape with inward form doth fage,[433]
Like Aphrogenia's ill-yoked marriage! 10
Fond physiognomer, complexion
Guides not the inward disposition,
Inclines I yield; thou sayst law; Julia, }
Or Cato's often-curst Scatinia, }
Can take no hold on simp'ring Lesbia. }
True, not on her eye; yet alum oft doth blast
The sprouting bud that fain would longer last.
Chary Casca, right pure, or Rhodanus,
Yet each night drinks in glassy Priapus.[434]
Yon pine is fair, yet foully doth it ill 20
To his own sprouts; mark, his rank drops distill
Foul Naples' canker[435] in their tender rind.
Woe worth, when trees drop in their proper kind!
Mistagogus, what means this prodigy?
When Hiadolgo speaks 'gainst usury,
When Verres rails 'gainst thieves, Milo doth hate
Murder, Clodius cuckolds, Marius the gate
Of squinting Janus shuts? Run beyond bound
Of _Nil ultra_, and hang me when one's found
Will be himself. Had nature turn'd our eyes 30
Into our proper selves, these curious spies
Would be ashamed: Flavia would blush to flout
When Oppia calls Lucina help her out,
If she did think Lynceus did know her ill,
How nature art, how art doth nature spill.
God pardon me! I often did aver,
_Quod gratis grate_, the astronomer
An honest man; but I'll do so no more.
His face deceived me; but now, since his whore
And sister are all one, his honesty 40
Shall be as bare as his anatomy,
To which he bound his wife. O, packstaff[436] rhymes!
Why not, when court of stars shall see these crimes?
Rods are in piss--ay, for thee, empirick,
That twenty grains of opium will not stick
To minister to babes. Here's bloody days,
When with plain herbs Mutius more men slays
Than ere third Edward's sword! Sooth, in our age,
Mad Coribantes need not to enrage
The people's minds. You, Ophiogeni[437] 50
Of Hellespont, with wrangling villainy
The swoll'n world's inly stung, then deign a touch,
If that your fingers can effect so much.
Thou sweet Arabian Panchaia,
Perfume this nasty age: smug Lesbia
Hath stinking lungs, although a simp'ring grace,
A muddy inside, though a surphuled[438] face.
O for some deep-searching Corycean,
To ferret out yon lewd Cinædian![439]
How now, Brutus, what shape best pleaseth thee? 60
All Protean forms, thy wife in venery,
At thy enforcement takes? Well, go thy way,
She may transform thee, ere thy dying day.
Hush, Gracchus hears, that hath retail'd more lies,
Broachèd more slanders, done more villainies,
Than Fabius' perpetual golden coat
(Which might have _Semper idem_ for a mott)
Hath been at feasts, and led the measuring[440]
At court, and in each marriage revelling;
Writ Palæphatus'[441] comment on those dreams 70
That Hylus takes, 'midst dung-pit reeking steams
Of Athos' hot-house. Gramercy, modest smile,
Chremes asleep! Paphia, sport the while.
Lucia, new set thy ruff; tut, thou art pure,
Canst thou not lisp "good brother," look demure?
Fie, Gallus, what, a sceptic Pyrrhonist,
When chaste Dictynna breaks the zonelike twist?
Tut, hang up hieroglyphics. I'll not feign,
Wresting my humour from his native strain.

[430] A regular physician, opposed to an empiric.

[431] Imitated from Juvenal, x. 221, "Quot Themison aegros
autumno occiderit uno."

[432] "_Male_ lie"--great, strong lie: perhaps in imitation of
Gr. arsin.

[433] Fadge.

[434] From Juvenal--"_Vitreo_ bibit ille _Priapo_," Sat. ii. 95.
The _vitreus Priapus_ was a drinking-cup fashioned in the shape
of a Priapus.

[435] "Naples' canker"--the pox.

[436] "Cf. Hall, Prol. B. iii. 'Satyres ... packstaff
plain.'"--_Grosart._

[437] "There is a certain kind of people to whom it is naturally
given, either by touching or sucking, to cure the wounding of
venomous serpents; called Psylli (a people of Libya) and Marsi,
people of Italy, bordering upon the Samnites, and Aequiculania,
and _those that were called by the ancient writers Ophiogenes,
which dwelt about Hellespont, as both Pliny, Aelianus, and Aeneas
Silvius do witness_."--Topsel's _Hist. of Serpents_, ed. 1658, p.
624.

[438] Washed with Cosmetics.

[439] Gr. kinaidos.

[440] The _measures_--a stately dance.

[441] The author of a treatise (Peri Apiston) on mythology.

SATIRE II.

_Difficile est Satiram non scribere._--JUVE.